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In Northern Ireland a woman has become the first person to be convicted for illegal abortion in at least a decade.

Abortion is subject to heated debate in N. Ireland: pregnant women sometimes travel to England for a termination

, says expert

Sally Sheldon has recently completed a study of the implications of medical abortion (abortions provoked using pills), which was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council; she is an unpaid trustee of the charitable provider of abortion services, BPAS. The views expressed are solely those of the writer. CNN is showcasing the work of The Conversation, a collaboration between journalists and academics to provide news analysis and commentary. The content is produced solely by The Conversation.

(CNN)A 21-year-old woman has been convicted in Northern Ireland for using abortion pills to terminate a pregnancy. She is the first person to be convicted for illegal abortion in Northern Ireland in at least a decade.

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In this case, the woman was sentenced to a three-month jail term, suspended for two years. She had obtained the pills online, having been unable to afford to travel to England to have a legal abortion. Her housemates reportedly informed the police of what she had done.

The relative leniency of the sentence injects a welcome note of compassion but this is nonetheless a case of a young woman who had exercised her reproductive rights being punished under draconian law.

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The 1861 act also applies in England and Wales but its harshest rules are mitigated by the later 1967 Abortion Act, which states that no offence is committed if abortions are carried out under conditions of strict medical control. But this act does not apply in Northern Ireland.

Not much of a choice

In Northern Ireland, women with unwanted pregnancies face a desperate dilemma. Some will manage to raise the £400 to £2,000 [$560 to $2,800] necessary for travel and the cost of an abortion elsewhere. They may seek money from loan sharks and the time needed to make these arrangements means that their abortions take place later in pregnancy than is the case for their sisters elsewhere in the UK. This creates a vicious circle. They may need to raise the additional funds necessary for a later, more expensive procedure.

Other women may drink bleach or deliberately throw themselves down stairs in an attempt to provoke a miscarriage.

A third group of women pursue the option of sourcing abortion pills online -- which is what has happened in this case.

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Among the many websites that supply the pills, two not-for-profit groups have become trusted suppliers to women in Northern Ireland: Women on Web and Women Help Women . Each offers abortion pills, on prescription, for use in the first nine weeks of pregnancy, for a donation of around £50 (which will be waived in conditions of financial hardship).

Women then take the pills according to the same straightforward, highly effective treatment protocol that might be used in an English clinic. It's extremely safe, provided that they have access to necessary and appropriate aftercare in the small number of cases where it is required. Yet these women risk prosecution.

A dated law in changing times

While abortion remains an issue of heated debate in Northern Ireland, the law that makes abortion pills illegal is the product of another time. It is characterised by mid-Victorian moral norms and medical realities. It was intended to punish sexual immorality, as well as the intentional killing of a foetus.

The law also aimed to protect women's health. At the time it was passed, there were no known methods to end a pregnancy without the woman also harming herself. This is reflected in the language of the statute, which prohibits the use of "poisonous or noxious substances".

Yet the abortion pills that women access online are far from poisons: they are recognised by the World Health Organisation as essential medicines. In a similar case in Australia, a jury refused to accept that abortion pills were "noxious substances". Having heard expert evidence on that issue, it acquitted the woman who had used them.

That prosecutions for illegal abortion have been so rare in Northern Ireland reflects the difficulty of enforcing existing law in anything other than a highly selective way. Attempting to prevent the delivery of abortion pills, for example, would involve searching for needles in haystacks. It also suggests a widespread reluctance to report, investigate or charge women for illegal abortions.

Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Texas has long been a hotbed of abortion protests, but the issue drew national attention in 2013 when new abortion restrictions were debated and then passed in the legislature. Above, opponents of the measure walk around supporters at the Capitol.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

It took not one but two special leglative sessions for the measure to pass; the first attempt was blocked following a lengthy filibuster by sneaker-wearing Sen. Wendy Davis in a near empty Senate chamber.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

In preparation for hours of speaking, Davis wore a pair of pink sneakers in place of her dress shoes. Her shoes became a symbol for abortion-rights activists.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Opponents of the bill sat in the gallery holding hangers. Among the changes Davis and others opposed: requiring abortion clinics to become ambulatory surgical center and requiring doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Davis said she was speaking for families whose "personal relationships with their doctor and their Creator" would be violated by the bill.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Abortion-rights advocates celebrate the defeat of the measure on June 25, 2013, the last day of that summer's first special legislative session. Davis' filibuster, combined with protests by supporters, helped defeat the legislation at midnight.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

As the second session was convened on July 1, 2013, Davis led a rally in support of women's rights to reproductive decisions.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Abortion-rights demonstrators gather at the state Capitol on July 1, 2013.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Supporters on both sides of the issue crowd into the rotunda of the state Capitol on July 1, 2013.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Anti-abortion demonstrators taped the word "life" over their mouths as they stood in the rotunda of the state Capitol in July 2013.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Opponents of an abortion bill yell outside the Capitol in July 2013.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Opponents of an abortion bill chant outside a hearing at the Capitol in July 2013.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Abortion-rights activists march from the Capitol in July 2013.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Supporters of an abortion bill listen to speakers at a July 2013 rally organized by the Texas Right to Life Organization.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Anti-abortion activist Pamela Whitehead, right, argues with an abortion-rights activist in July 2013.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Supporters of the measure react in the gallery of the Texas House after it was provisionally approved during the second special session on July 9, 2013.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Opponents of the bill yell outside the Texas House after the bill was provisionally approved.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

On October 28, 2013, the day before the legislation was scheduled to take effect, a federal judge ruled that parts of it were unconstitutional. Above, state troopers look on as a group in Austin, Texas, protests the law.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Three days later, on October 31, 2013, the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the federal district judge's decision. Here, a woman holds her rosary beads as she prays on the sidewalk across the street from Planned Parenthood in Fort Worth, Texas.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

As the Texas case wound its way through the courts, a group from Texas joined an anti-abortion demonstration on the Mall in Washington on January 22, 2014 -- the 41st anniversary of the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Meanwhile, Wendy Davis' 2013 filibuster propelled her to the Democratic Party's nomination for Texas governor. Here, she listens as Houston City Council member Ellen Cohen speaks about the law in October 2014, just weeks before Davis was defeated by Republican Greg Abbott.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

On the 42nd anniversary of Roe v. Wade -- January 22, 2015 -- Evan Keimig of Houston, left, and Brandan Solcher of Sugarland, Texas, wear Vatican flags in front of the U.S. Capitol following a "March for Life" protest.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

The following month, college students and abortion-rights activists rallied on the steps of the Texas Capitol as the legislature met on February 26, 2015.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

In July 2015, Erica Canaut, center, and other anti-abortion activists rallied on the steps of the Texas Capitol to condemn the use of tissue samples obtained from aborted fetuses for medical research.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Texas again became the focus of the abortion debate after a group produced a series of videos depicting Planned Parenthood officials appearing to talk about the price of fetal tissue. But an investigation into the allegations backfired on the accusers when prosecutors cleared Planned Parenthood -- and instead indicted two people involved in making the video. Above, one of the two defendants, Sandra Merritt, right, hugs a supporter after appearing in court to post bond on February 3, 2016.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

David Daleiden, the other defendant in the indictment over the videos, speaks to media and supporters after turning himself in the following day in Houston. Daleiden and Sandra Merritt are charged with tampering with a governmental record, a felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison. Both have pleaded not guilty.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

With the Supreme Court hearing on the Texas law approaching, Whole Woman's Health -- which is challenging the law -- held a gathering at a San Antonio clinic on February 9, 2016.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

In a dramatic ruling, the Supreme Court on June 27 threw out a Texas abortion access law in a victory to supporters of abortion rights who argued it would have shuttered all but a handful of clinics in the state.

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Photos:History of Texas' abortion fight

Texas Governor Greg Abbott has been a proponent of new rules, slated to take effect December 9, that would require health care facilities to bury or cremate fetal remains. "I believe it is imperative to establish higher standards that reflect our respect for the sanctity of life," Abbott said in fundraising email.

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It is also worth remembering the near universal condemnation of Donald Trump's ill-judged comment that women who have illegal abortions should be punished. Even those who are strongly opposed to abortion on moral or religious grounds very frequently agree that threatening women with prison should be no part of a civilised society's response to unwanted pregnancy.

Those who are sincere in the desire to reduce the numbers of abortions should recognise that restrictive abortion laws do not result in fewer abortions. Their highly discriminatory impact is rather to force wealthier women to travel and poorer women to access illegal services. Abortions are pushed underground, making them less safe and harming -- indeed, in some instances, killing -- women. Reducing the number of abortions can only be achieved by preventing unwanted pregnancies and this requires focusing on sex education and access to contraception rather than threatening prison.

The arrest and subsequent prosecution of a desperate teenager should provide a clarion call for Stormont, the Northern Irish legislature, to face up to these facts.

Sally Sheldon has recently completed a study of the implications of medical abortion (abortions provoked using pills), which was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council; she is an unpaid trustee of the charitable provider of abortion services, BPAS. The views expressed are solely those of the writer. CNN is showcasing the work of The Conversation, a collaboration between journalists and academics to provide news analysis and commentary. The content is produced solely by The Conversation.